Villains…
When readers and writers think of main characters, they’re often thinking about protagonists, the heroes of a tale. Villains are the antagonists, characters who make life difficult for the protagonists. But they can be main characters too.
Consider the Jackal in Forsyth’s thriller classic, The Day of the Jackal. He IS the main character, no doubt about it. He plays a more important role than anyone who’s after him. [Spoiler alert.] The protagonist, if there is one, might be the French Sûreté detective (I don’t remember his name) who helps stop the assassination of De Gaulle.
Often authors writing series have their villains appear in multiple books for multiple reasons, but I suspect the main reason is that villains can be more interesting than heroes. We analyze them under the lens of our writer’s microscope. We see their complexity in a first book of the series and imagine there’s more for readers (and us!) to know about them. When a villain pops in and out of our stories, s/he helps stitch them together as much as a recurring protagonist. Both their complexities grow, and the two become the yin and yang of the series.
Harry Potter vs. Voldemort is a case in point. Harry naturally grew more complex as he got older. But in each novel of the series, we discover more about Voldemort, the villain, and his complexity grows. Readers will probably think it’s strange that I consider Voldemort Rowling’s best character—his development is more interesting than Harry’s, maybe because we confront it piece by piece. He’s always the same Voldemort, but we learn more about him as the series progresses. After all, Harry’s being trained at Hogwarts. He has to grow, right? And Harry would be a nobody if Voldemort weren’t there to make trouble.
Sometimes my villains seem to take over too. Dimitri Negrini in Come Dance a Cumbia…with Stars in Your Hand!, dominates the entire novel, for example. This maniacal industrialist is a complex villain. If the “Chaos Chronicles Trilogy” is my Foundation trilogy, then Negrini plays the role of the Mule of Asimov’s Second Foundation.
There’s one villain who I kept around for a long time, the Russian Vladimir Kalinin. He’s a presence through two series and two bridge books in my “Future History Timeline.” (See the list of free PDF downloads on the “Free Stuff & Contests’ web page.) He also appears in the novella “The Phantom Harvester.” (See the same list.) Not even Detective Castilblanco has that staying power as a character.
And Volodya (nickname for Vladimir) is quite the clever fellow in all his evil complexity and even shows he has a good side too (roses for the dying Lydia Karpov in The Midas Bomb and love for the adopted orphan in No Amber Waves of Grain).
I became attached to old Vladimir even though he’s a scurrilous devil. That happens. And it often leads to readers remembering the antagonists more than the protagonists.
There are many famous villains—Moriarity, the Mule, Voldemort, the Jackal, and so forth. Together we can probably generate a long list of them. When someone asks about my favorite fictional characters, I have to include them. And I just might forget who they battle against.
What about you? Do you have any favorite villains? Do you want to add to my list?
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Comments are always welcome.
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Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!
